Over the past decade, the foodie-craze in the US has blown up. We’re so crazy about food that we love TV shows about making and eating food, and we love TV shows about people who have eaten too much, have hit rock bottom and need to lose weight to save their lives. One aspect of the craze that’s really gained popularity in most urban areas is the proliferation of culinary food-factories on wheels, the food truck.

No longer are food trucks the lowest echelon of the dining experience, relegated to construction sites, stocked with food that would make any High School lunch lady week, and brimming with potential food-born illness. Food trucks have become chic, entrepreneurial, restaurants on wheels. In Southern California it started with trucks like the Kogi Korean BBQ truck, but now it’s blown up to include all genres of classic and fusion cuisine. The food is delicious enough to muster a reasonably high price tag for a meal served in a paper serving tray, and the trucks are ubiquitous.

Here’s the challenge, most (not all) of these trucks pack a tremendous amount of calories, carbs and fat into their menu. Like any restaurant, there are usually some healthy options and you can request sauces on the side and substitutions to make your food truck order a bit healthier. However, I have found the draw of these trucks to be the over-the-top creative menus, the fact that they go ‘over-the-top’ with things like batter, butter, sauces and did I already mention butter? So am I going to blame the trucks for the weight problem in America? Definitely not. I’m a firm believer in personal power and accountability. These trucks are giving people what they want. However, I do think that their proliferation raises yet another “watch out” for those who want to eat healthy and lose weight. I’ve seen people who would typically eat healthy have a similar reaction to little kids when the ice-cream truck would drive by when we were little, once they see food trucks lined up outside of my office. I also believe they trigger a similar array of bad choice justification responses, that happens when going to the fair and ordering very unhealthy things. The “Hey, It’s fair food and I don’t get to eat this all the time.” Well, unfortunately with food trucks you can eat about as badly as you would at the county fair on a much more regular basis.

Again, there are some reasonably healthy options, so all food trucks aren’t created equally. However, most of their menus are a nutrition nightmare. My advice is a) be very picky about what you do or don’t eat from a food truck, and b) your best bet is to “keep on truckin'” and don’t stop at their windows to begin with.

There’s a great article on Wellfesto.com titled “10 Things I Want My Daughter to Know About Working Out”. As a father to a daughter and son, I would personally swap “Child” for the word “Daughter” in the title, because I think these lessons are important for all little human beings. I’ll let you peruse the article for more detail, but will provide a thumbnail sketch of the “10 Things” below:

Strength equals self-sufficiency.

Fitness opens doors.

The bike is the new golf course.

Exercise is a lifestyle, not an event.

Health begets health.

Endorphins help you cope.

Working out signals hard-working.

If you feel beautiful, you look beautiful.

Nature rules.

Little eyes are always watching.

These are super tips to pass on to the next generation, and I think they’re spot on. A couple of comments. First, how can you argue with items 1 and 2 — spot on! Second, number 4 represents a huge miss for many. If you don’t figure out a way to weave ‘health’ into your life in a meaningful, manageable way, you won’t stick with it – – I suggest small steps! I am drawn to number 5, because I do believe that you are “who you spend time with”. Lastly, in a nation that is becoming more obese by the day, we need to figure out that to break the cycle, it actually starts with us. We must role model healthy lifestyles.

I just came across a snippet on Yahoo! titled “7 Foods That Tell Your Body “I’m Full!””. I’m a fan of not feeling quite full, and think that the challenge for some is to re-program their mind-set from one that always seeks to “be full” to one that can happily exist being “a little hungry”. However, as with anything balance is the best path forward, so knowing what foods help your body (and mind) ‘feel full’ can only be a good thing. Here are the seven called out in the Yahoo! piece.

Lentils

Avocados

Apples

Hot Anything

Dark Chocolate

Eggs

Nuts

These are a few of my favorite things, but I must admit that I wish I had ever experienced actually craving an apple.

Want to drop 5 pounds the easy way? You probably don’t have to make any changes to what you eat for breakfast, lunch or dinner. All you have to do is eliminate high calorie snacks, soft drinks and appetizers.

Since buying my Fitbit, I’ve been taking a baseline of my calorie burn vs. intake each day. Now I’ve actually been a pretty healthy eater for the past 20 years and wasn’t looking to lose any weight when starting the evaluation process. However, while taking this baseline it made it very clear how easy it could be to hit my ~2,200 calorie / day target. and how easily it could be missed with just one or two bad choices. Take for example my dinner at Chipotle last week. I always order a very healthy rendition of the Burrito Bowl with Chicken, brown rice, black beans, lettuce, and guacamole (no dairy). This burrito bowl is filling, tastes great, and comes in just around 710 calories. I’m fine with a 710 calorie dinner, particularly if it’s that tasty and the calories are all working for me. However, I do allow myself a few dietary vices, and since chips and salsa are two of my favorite things, so I am no stranger to a side of tortilla chips to accompany my burrito bowl. They’re also incredibly tasty. When I went to enter the side of chips into my FitBit Log, I was blown away. These “empty calorie machines” come in with an average of 570 calories per order. So, the little side dish that went along with my meal almost doubled my calorie intake that evening (from 710 to 1,280 calories). Does this mean I won’t ever get tortilla chips at Chipotle, absolutely not, as I said I do enjoy and allow myself the decedent, salty, crispy calorie bombs from time-to-time. However, I will do it much less frequently, and within a better understanding of my total caloric intake over a given day.

Things like sucking down 1 or 2 sugary sodas at 180 calories each (x2 = 360 empty calories), sharing an appetizer before dinner (e.g. 800 calories in a Bloomin’ Onion at Outback Steakhouse), or nibbling on a bag of potato chips mid-afternoon (each little bag has similar calories to a sugary soda), can completely destroy an otherwise reasonable meal plan.

So what? Well, assuming you’re eating relatively well and hold the other aspects of your regimen constant, eliminating some of these high calories sneak attacks and holding everything else constant would be an easy way to lose 5 pounds in just a few weeks.

So I’ve had a Nike Fuelband since they introduced them. I literally pre-ordered my first, have had a few and have amassed 4,000,000+ in Nike Fuel since. I found the band really cool looking, and love the idea of daily steps, fuel, and activity goals. Over the past few months however, Nike has buried the Fuelband functionality of their web-site within layers of marketing “sell”, there have been countless data syc issues, and I heard recently they are going to discontinue the Fuelband and focus on fitness software as well as their core fitness shoe/apparel business. Given these factors, it is time to make a change.

I did some research to refresh my knowledge of products on the market, read reviews, and sampled the web applications. The winner, by far in my opinion, was the FitBit. It’s about 33% less expensive than the Fuelband, their website is simple, loads quickly, has a better ‘sense of community’ relative to Nike, and the band looks good. In addition, the devise and website does a much better job of capturing total health. This includes tracking how well you’re sleeping, calories in, calories out, water consumed, active hours, weight/BMI, and steps. It also has goals for each of these elements and does a nice job of patting you on the back and ringing the alarm when you hit a goal or new achievement.

I’m all in and really enjoying being a new member of the FitBit community. I still use my Nike Running app, as I believe it’s a simple, robust tracking, music and motivational tool for indoor/outdoor runs, but everything else is now FitBit.

Thorndike’s “Law of Effect” (1905) stated that, “responses that produce a satisfying effect in a particular situation become more likely to occur again in that situation, and responses that produce a discomforting effect become less likely to occur again in that situation.” It’s one of the core tenets of behavioral psychology. It’s not rocket science. Behaviors that are followed by a positive (satisfying) effect tend to be repeated, and behaviors that are followed by a negative (discomforting) effect become less likely to occur. In extreme cases, negative consequences will completely eliminate or extinguish a behavior. While it’s probably quite clear that Thorndike was onto something with his law of effect, it may not be clear how this relates to health. I think it has a very interesting, perhaps inverse, link to both physical fitness and diet.

To be healthy takes effort, and there’s a psychological hurdle that anyone has to overcome, before the “satisfying” benefits outweigh the “discomfort”. In essence, any successful “health turnaround” requires enough motivation and commitment to stick with the new, healthier routine for 60-90 days before the law of effect begins working in your favor. However, when you begin trying to eat healthy you often feel like crap, are constantly fighting strong cravings, and you may actually be in state of “poor diet withdrawal” as your body expels the built up toxins. And when you start a work-out routine, your muscles ache, your throat may burn (when running), and you feel every single moment of pain as your body tells you, “you really haven’t been doing enough of this activity, so you’re going to pay for it”. Thordike’s law kicks in, and although you want to look and feel better, sitting on the couch, eating a pizza and watching Modern Family makes you happy immediately – – so this much easier habit is more likely to be repeated.

It’s not an easy gamut to run, but I think understanding the hurdle and building a plan to tackle it may help you win the war, even if you lose a few battles along the way. The goal is simple. Begin taking enough small steps when it comes to nutrition and fitness, so that you begin feeling “better” (aka start building a stockpile of healthy “satisfiers”). Fight through the cravings and pain for 60-90 days, and the way you look and feel will improve, and the “pain” will lesson. Before you know it, you will have flipped the “Law of Effect” so that if you were to eat something you know is bad for you, or miss a workout, you’ll feel like @#$@! And, on the contrary, eating healthy and working out will feel great (as will the way others respond to you). When the “Law of Effect” working for your health and not against it, you’re on the right path!!!

When I was growing up, I seem to remember healthy meals just didn’t taste that good. They tended to be simple, bland and almost cried “hey, I’m healthy, so I’m not supposed to taste good.” Well, times have changed, and healthy meals can be prepared in ways that taste great. There are a ton of ‘healthier’ substitutes that can crank up the health index on a meal, without sacrificing taste, and I’ve blogged about some of them before. This passage isn’t about substitutes, or how to make the perfect meal. It’s simply about a few things that I believe can add some flavor, zing, and life to your diet and keep you on track with regards to your health and fitness goals. They include:

Hummus – The most under-appreciated dip/spread in the US, and I think it’s poised to become more popular and ubiquitous. It’s an incredible dip for veggies, and can be spread on a sandwich to add a really killer, spicy, rich kick. Oh, and it’s good for you. I’m one step away from an “I love hummus” t-shirt. Can you tell?

Salsa – There are thousands of varieties, heat levels, etc., and salsa can wake up any savory entree. When I think of foods that typically “call out” to add something bad (e.g. bake potatoes), I skip the bad stuff and pile on the salsa. Yeah!

Avocado – Perhaps it’s received too much press over the last few years as Subway learned it was a “super food” and that they could up-sell it on everything. However, it’s delicious, has a buttery, nutty note, and can add depth and texture to your meal. Don’t over-do-it with the avocado, because even as a super food with good fat, it still is calorie rich. Use it sparingly and strategically.

Feta Cheese – As a general rule, I stay away from cheese. Cheese isn’t all bad for you, and has many things in it that are good for you. However, I found cheese to be far too easy to add to things, and a quick way to pile on the calories and fat. Feta cheese has such a powerful, pronounced taste, crumbles very small (so you are less likely to over-do-it), and adds a nice salty taste to a healthy salad, spinach & egg white omelet, or whatever your eating (almost).

These are a few of my favorite things, to add to my favorite things. Use these magic ingredients and your healthy meals, can be tasty-healthy meals. Anything I should consider adding to my repertoire? I’d love to hear.

First of all, I hope you had a warm, safe and and fun New Year holiday. Yes, it’s 2014 and although I can have almost any product appear at my door in two days via Amazon Prime, I’m still waiting on my hovercraft and teleporter to arrive. Perhaps next year.

As you likely already knew, the beginning of each year not only brings a symbolic close to the one before, but it brings with it a chance to turn over a new leaf, do something different, or tackle a goal that’s been waiting in the wings (or suppressed) for too long. Whether it come in the form of a resolution (which I feel is synonymous with “something I won’t be doing 30 days from now”) or a more formal plan of attack, I’m a fan of any milestone that drives even potential positive personal change.

Regardless of any large-scale plans you have for 2014, I would love it if you would also weave some “small steps” into what’s going to make you a better, healthier, and happier version of yourself in the new year. Pick 3 to 5 small things you can do that won’t feel like significant actions in isolation, but when strung together can make a meaningful difference. Things like…

“No stairs in 2014”

At least 48oz of water/day in 2014

100 sit-ups/50 push-ups/day in 2014

A 20 minute brisk walk during lunch 3 out of 5 days in 2014

No going back for 2nds in 2014

Resign my membership to “The Clean Plate Club” in 2014

Run a 5K, 10K, mudder, 1/2 Marathon, full Marathon, RAGNAR, or some other event in 2014

Spend more time outside in 2014

No “Drive Thru” in 2014 (this is possible by the way)

50 Jumping Jacks during TV Commercials at least 1/Day in 2014

Connect with a dear friend you haven’t spoken with in a while in 2014

…add any of 1,000,000 other small steps you could come up with here as options.

It’s not about the magnitude, it’s about stringing together good decisions that when combined will make you healthier in mind, body and/or soul. String enough of them together long enough, and before you know it you will have changed how you operate, in a good way, without feeling that “cold turkey”, mountain-to-climb, heavy feeling that makes it seem like the changes are fighting your natural behaviors, desires, etc.

I wish you and yours the best in 2014, and hope that it’s a launch pad to a healthier you. Cheers!